UPDATE: Looks like I had the defensive advantage on the wrong side; I over-complicated what should have been a head-to-head comparison and missed the mark. This spread needed some work to sort out the offense/defense pairing. In practice, the original spread did not lend itself to a clean judgment regarding the forces at work, so I created an alternate version. Each “Upper Hand” card has been changed to a “Defense Mode” indicator for the partner on that side of the layout, with the idea that it will counter the other partner’s “Attack Mode” card. The “Upper Hand” will be decided by doing a numerical “essence” calculation for the population of eight cards that will yield a trump card to be compared to the two “Partner” cards to see which it favors. Various methods for determining the “favored” partner can be applied, particularly inherent compatibility and commonality across different forms of esoteric correspondence. (I did not re-do this reading, but will just note that the “Essence” card would have been the Chariot, favoring the stronger of the two Earth cards and, the 10 of Wands would have indicated a more potent defense for the Texans than the 6 of Cups would have for the Bills. However, I’m thinking that even setting the 10 of Wands against the Bills’ much-more-imposing Emperor would have yielded the same prediction: a Bills’ win.)

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Here I’m applying my new “Weaponized Relationship” spread to predict the outcome of an NFL football game. I’m not trying to determine the scoring, just which team will dominate the flow and therefore win the game. The Texans are hosting the Bills in Houston, so before drawing the cards I intentionally established them as Team #1 in the lower-left position, with the Bills as Team #2 at the lower-right. I’m using the “Weapon” card at the top-center to describe the likely complexion of the game in terms of strategies and tactics for the contest as a whole.

The complexion of the upcoming game seems to be one of strategic defense rather than brute-force offense (Prince of Cups). It looks like the Texans will be slow to gain momentum (Knight of Disks) and could be a little “flat” on offense (5 of Disks), while the Bills are the team the “smart money” is on (10 of Disks, “Wealth”) since the bettors “moneyline” shows them to have a 70% chance of winning. Just looking at the color palette – fiery red vs. neutral tones – for the opposing “attack” cards speaks volumes. (Although I chose not to use reversals and turned all the cards upright, the Knight of Disks initially came up reversed, indicating that the Texans will be without their starting quarterback, who recently suffered a concussion.)

The Bills’ offense (Emperor) exhibits confident command of the field and their offensive line might well run roughshod over the Texans defense (10 of Wands, “Oppression”), while the Texans’ will have no luck containing the Bills’ attack (flip side of the 10 of Wands). This aggressive match-up appears to be the key factor in the game.

The Texans’ offense (5 of Disks, “Worry”) seems schizophrenic and flat-footed while it looks like the Bills’ poised defense (6 of Cups) will “swamp” the Texans’ ground game. (The Thoth title for this card is counterintuitive since I can’t see calling any aspect of a football game “Pleasure” unless it’s for elated fans.)

The Texans’ lackadaisical “Upper Hand” card (flip side of the 6 of Cups, which is the second “negative polarity” card in a row for the Texans’ attack against the Bills’ two “positive” cards) suggests that they won’t move the ball with their passing game either (I’m thinking that the offensively toothless Water card could mean anemic ball-control with incomplete passes, interceptions and fumbles at critical moments, most likely forced by the Bills’ defensive pressure).

Echoing the odds-makers’ professional opinion, these cards indicate a decisive Buffalo victory mainly due to offensive superiority and a “smothering” defensive line. It’s possible that the 5.5-point advantage given by the betting algorithms will be on the low side.